Tears
by Mrs-Two-Star
Summary: Gillian-centric. Slight Callian and kind of dark.


I don't own anything. Just the idea for this fic.

Tears

by

JustLikeGill

He pads into her office, his shoes off. He knows in the back of his mind she needs him.

The first thing he hears is her deep breathing, she's asleep. Then he looks around the corner and sees her stretched out on the couch. Her high heels were abandoned under her desk and her box of tissues that were rarely used are now empty. He steps closer to look at her face and sees dried tracks of mascara down her cheeks. Her hand is up on her head and her fingers are thread through her own hair, she fell asleep rubbing her head-something he knows calms her. The tissues that are missing from the tissue box have taken residence on the floor next to the couch. On the table next to her couch was a broken glass and a bottle of nearly full scotch. 'Why didn't she come to me?' Her forhead has a huge scratch across it and dried blood surrounding the scratch.

* * *

She doesn't know why she does it, maybe it's the stress...or the anger. She doesn't know, but what she does know is that it always happens when the bills are slightly behind and she keeps getting the notices for late bills. It triggers the memory, and she does it all over again.

It takes her back to age five, she's hiding under the kitchen table when her father comes home drunk. She hears crashes and is afraid to leave the room. Her dad might come after her. So she sits there and hears her mother screaming his name over and over, asking him to stop.

The next day when she sees her mother she always has scratches. Her mother is afraid to leave her bed, and there's a mess of broken dishes scattering the kitchen floor. Her dad is in his office the whole day, doing who knows what.

Everytime Gillian sees it she doesn't know what to do and she gets so stressed until she starts panicking. Panicking to the point of a serious panic attack. She starts with having to clean her room, then when she feels a stray hair fall into her eyes she snaps. It's like some one else is taking over her body and she starts crying histarically. It gets so bad she screams at the hair and pulls it out of her head, then falls to the ground and crys harder. She starts scratching at her arms and forhead, trying to put physical pain to her emotional pain. She does it until she passes out.

When she wakes up she puts on her pajamas and crawls up into her bed. Not cleaning up the dried blood on her forhead or arms. When she would stay in bed until after eleven her mom would get worried and come into her room to check on her. She would be so shocked at the blood, each time. And no matter what Gillian would say, her mother always assumed it was her husband drunk again.

* * *

When Gillian went to college and got out of the house her panic attacks stopped.

At least until mid-terms. She would have piles and piles of papers to study. She wouldn't get any sleep. And everynight before she took a mid-term, at about 3:04 she would snap. The coffee wasn't sweet enough, or it was too cold, whatever it was would make her snap and she would throw the coffee mug across the room. After two broken mugs she started drinking from plastic mugs. The sound of it hitting the wall would make her jump and cry louder. Her neatly stacked papers would be thrown around the room, covering her floor in a sea of white and ink.

She wore a ring, a promise ring. When she would scratch at her forhead it would make the scratches worse, deeper. Once the blood from her forhead rolled down her face she would go to the bathroom to stop the bleeding. But once she saw her reflection it made it worse. She threw light punches at the mirror and tossed water against it until she wears herself down. She would barely make it to the couch before passing out.

She wakes up the next day around noon and cleans up the house. It takes all day and she scolds herself for letting this happen again.

She returns to school the day after, having to make up the mid-terms she missed the day before.

* * *

When she met Alec she was happy. They were both still in college and they met at the coffee shop between schools. He made her so happy the panic attacks went away. Even durring mid-terms. They would study together and he made her relax.

They spent the rest of college together and when he asked her to marry him she hadn't been happier. Of course she loved him. She could tell by the way he relaxed her. She could be herself with him. And they loved each other for who they already were. She loved him and would shout it off a rooftop.

* * *

They had been married a year and a half when she had the first panic attack in years. They had a fight about his using and he stormed out of the house telling her he was going to find some. He'd be back when he found the happiness he was looking for.

At first she got furious. So mad that she threw the framed pictures of him around. Slightly delighting in the sound of breaking glass. Until one of the pieces of glass found it's way into her foot. She cried, hard and loud. She pound her fists at his pillows and tore them apart until light fluffy material spilled out of them onto the floor.

She hit the floor in a fit of tears and grabbed fistfuls of her own hair and scratched at her head. The wedding ring flooded her face with blood from the gash she made on her own forhead.

Once the bleeding stopped and she noticed the pool of blood around her, she passed out.

When she wakes up his arms are around her, craddling her gently and telling her how sorry he is. And that he never meant it and he'll never say anything like it again. A cool rag touches her forhead and she jumps. He explains its to clean her up and she relaxes into his arms for the rest of the night.

* * *

When she met Cal she had one. Something about this man. She instantly found a bond that she would sware had been there from birth.

He made her laugh and smile, something hard to find from her husband anymore. They became friends and she lied to him. Something she knew, from his book, he didn't like, and knew how to spot. But this one lie, would bring her a friend she needed.

And this one lie made her fall into a panic attack. She doesn't lie. Not after her being lied to by her mother and father for her entire childhood. But she was lying to someone she was trying to build a friendship with. She couln't take it. It made fer cry and scratch at herself until she passed out in her office at the Pentagon.

* * *

They had been relatively happy for a while. He got a sponser to help him from using and Gillian supported his decision. He had a few days where it was extremely hard to deal with and it would take everything she had to keep him from doing the worst to himself, or her.

After he started spending more time with his sponser than he was spending with her, Gillian started to have them again.

They would be smaller, more like stress than a panic attack. She would get bad headaches and call Cal when Alec wasn't around. She would ask him to bring over Thai. He would be there as soon as he could. He would rub her head until she calmed down and fell asleep.

When Alec would walk through the door and see Gillian sound asleep, but her hands curled into fists he would know why he was there and be extremely thankful someone was there with her. Alec would thank Cal then take his spot on the couch rubbing Gillian's hair.

* * *

Gillian had them bad durring the divorce. Cutting her arms with pieces of the broken glass from whatever she was drinking. Then screaming how awful he was to her. Each time the cuts kept getting deeper until she had to go to the hospital from loss of blood. And her cries would be so loud she couldn't talk the next day.

She spent a lot of time at Cal's during the divorce. He made it better. He had always known how to.

* * *

Once the divorce was settled she stopped having them so intensely. Occasionally she would jolt awake at night because she was scratching at herself. Or work would stress her out and she would do paperwork in Cal's office. He would sit on his couch with her and rub her head and hair while she read employee evaluations to him.

* * *

Then she met David. Dr. David Burns. When she was with him, her panic attacks stopped. She thought they had stopped for good. Hell, she didn't feel stress at all when she was with him. She was in love.

She would lay down with her head in his lap and tell him about her panic attacks. Just incase she got one, she wanted him to know what to do.

* * *

She didn't think she would ever have one again with him...then he was abducted.

She pulled her hair back into a ponytail that morning to keep any hair from falling in her eyes and triggering an attack. Once she got to work she paced in Cal's office, trying to keep herself busy. She angrily pulled at her jacket as she paced.

They were in the van and tears pushed at her eyes and she grabbed fistfuls of the dark material covering her head. One of her more serious attacks threatened to start and she held her breath.

When she saw him, bruised and beaten, she dug her nails into her own palm, hoping that the little amount of pain would help her stave off a painful attack. Cleaning his wounds and taking care of him got her mind off of it; it kept her busy.

At the end of the long day, when she saw him at the hospital she was so happy that he was alright. All she wanted to do was rush to his house and lay with him for days. When he walked out of the room and Cal told her what they were planning to do with him she started to break down there.

Once she got home one of the worst attacks she had ever had hit her. She threw her glass of scotch to the wall and grabbed handfuls of glass shards. Scraping them against her skin.

It got so bad she blacked out and didn't remember half the things she did to herself. She woke up the next morning wih glass still in her arm and dried blood surrounding his name that she had carved into her left arm. There was a gash on the side of her head and she had figured, due to the matching blood, that she slammed her head against the kitchen counter. The chain necklace he had given her was ripped apart and strung down her hallway. A pint of his mint chocolate chip ice cream that he left at her apartment was melted and covering her kitchen floor.

* * *

Then it happened. Cal asked her out. They dated for a while before he popped the question. Needless to say Emily was ecstatic about it. Since her and Cal started dating she hadn't had a panic attack. Or stress, really. Slight stress that she could handle, with his help.

They got married outside. A dragonfly landed on Gillian's curled hair. Cal recited vows to her that he had written himself. It was a fairy-tale wedding.

On their honeymoon, Cal got to watch Gillian dive into cake fully unclothed. Something they both thoroughly enjoyed.

* * *

Her first panic attack since they started dating happened when Emily went missing, turns out she was with her friend and lost her phone. But Gillian got so worried looking for her, Cal had to put the breaks on finding Emily just to take care of Gillian.

It wasn't an intense one, just some broken glass.

* * *

When the bills were getting hard to pay and they were getting late notices she would have them. She would take permanent marker to them and most of her uncovered body. The scratches on her forhead were deeper than they were when she had been married to Alec. Cal had gotten her a bigger ring. And her wedding ring had to be taken to the jeweler to get cleaned at least four times a year. She hated doing the finances, but she knew it would be worse if her husband got a hold of them.

She drank scotch to try and calm her, it rarely worked and she would end up with another broken glass and barely any missing alcohol. By the time he came into her office worrying about her, she would be passed out on the floor or the couch. Its not like she got them everyday or anything. He did his best to calm her when she did have them. He would rub her hair and calm her by humming along quietly to her favorite songs.

For the most part he did good keeping her calm. And did good loving her. Emily, Gillian and Cal. A happy family.

* * *

He brushes her hair out of her eyes and slowly wakes her up. When she finally stirs awake he has a warm rag to wipe up her blood. She cries and grabs onto his shirt. Before he can wipe any of her blood she's crying and burying her face into his chest, asking him to take her home and hold her. He wants to do anything that will make her happy again. She's always so optimistic and happy. Shooting stars make her eyes light up. And spending a day in bed with him would make her the happiest girl in the world. Hearing him say I love you makes her so happy she makes an adorable squeaking noise.

* * *

She's never been so happy, but she still gets her attacks sometimes. But he's there to help her through them. It's just something that she's going to have to live the rest of her life with.


End file.
